Stuck In: A Field Guide to the British Bookplate, From Stern Victorians to Cats in Glasses

There are few objects in British bookish life quite as passive-aggressive as the bookplate. A small square of paper, glued inside a front board, it can say 'This is mine' with the quiet menace of a parking notice. It can also say 'I am a person of taste, a little learning and possibly a heraldic crest I have not entirely earned'. And then, in the modern manner, it can say 'Please return this book, or the cat in spectacles will find you'.

The ex libris — Latin for 'from the books of' — is having a moment. Not a loud moment. You will not see it trending beside sourdough. But in second-hand bookshops, at provincial book fairs and on the desks of indie designers, the bookplate is creeping back. As the nights draw in this November, it seems a good time to look at what these little labels reveal about ownership, vanity and the peculiar British relationship with lending books we secretly never expect to see again.

The sticker that says 'hands off'

A bookplate is a peculiar thing: a piece of personal branding that only works when hidden. It lives inside the book, out of sight, until someone opens it. Then it delivers a small, silent lecture. The message is usually one of three: I own this; I am proud of owning this; and I would like it back, thank you.

Victorian plates often went further. They could be magnificently stern. Armorial shields, Latin mottos, tangled family trees and warnings to borrowers that sounded like a magistrate's sentencing remarks. 'If thou steal this book, the plague of Egypt shall follow thee' was not unheard of in spirit, if not always in exact wording. The modern equivalent is a Post-it note saying 'PLEASE RETURN — THIS MEANS YOU, DAVE'. Less Latin, same energy.

What makes British bookplates so appealing is the sheer range of polite lunacy. One plate will feature a sober library scene and a motto about wisdom. Another will feature a hedgehog in a waistcoat. Both are sincere. Both are someone's reading identity in miniature.

A short, nosy history

Bookplates arrived in Britain in the sixteenth century, imported from continental Europe along with other clever ideas and slightly too much religious controversy. Early examples were handmade, often by the same engravers who produced coats of arms. By the nineteenth century, the bookplate had become a middle-class status symbol: a way for the newly bookish to announce that their shelves were not merely furniture.

The twentieth century was less kind. Mass-produced books, cheap paperbacks and the collapse of the private library meant fewer people needed an ex libris. Why commission an engraving when a biro on the flyleaf would do? The bookplate survived in school prizes, institutional libraries and the drawers of people who inherit things and are not sure what to do with them.

Now, according to the collectors and designers who still care, it is returning. Not as a status symbol, but as a small, tactile pleasure. A bookplate is slower than a signature. It requires a decision. It says: I have thought about this book, and I have thought about you opening it.

What collectors look for

I spoke to a collector — let us call her Margaret, because she is the sort of person who would rather not be in the newspaper, even a digital one — who has been picking up ex libris for thirty years. She keeps them in a shoebox labelled 'Plates (not dinner)'. Her advice is reassuringly unpretentious.

'Look at the paper first,' she says. 'Old plates are often on thin, laid paper. If it feels like a modern label, it probably is. Then look at the printing. Engraving has a crispness that photocopies cannot fake, however hard they try.'

She looks for provenance: names, dates, mottos, odd little clues. A plate belonging to a doctor may have a caduceus. A plate belonging to a hopeful novelist may have a quill and an expression of quiet desperation. 'The best ones are not the grandest,' Margaret insists. 'They are the ones where you can tell the owner had a sense of humour. A lion rampant is fine. A lion rampant holding a library card is better.'

If you want to start collecting, Margaret suggests book fairs, charity shops and the backs of old hardbacks. The Bookplate Society is also a sensible port of call for the seriously smitten. Expect to pay anything from a few pounds for a common Victorian plate to considerably more for a signed Arts and Crafts design. As with all collecting, the joy is in the looking, not the boasting.

The designers bringing it back

Contemporary designers have taken the bookplate in a different direction. One designer I spoke to, who works under the name Penny Press, produces small runs of ex libris for readers who want something more personal than a name stamp and less permanent than a tattoo.

'People ask for cats in spectacles, obviously,' she says. 'Also foxes reading maps, owls with tea cups, and one man who wanted a badger in a duffel coat holding a copy of Middlemarch. We do not ask questions. We just draw the badger.'

Her plates are printed on acid-free paper and sold in packs of twenty. Customers can choose a name, a motto and a small illustration. Popular mottos include 'Borrowed books are still books', 'I was going to lend this' and 'Return me or the cat will know'. The tone is affectionate rather than aggressive. The twentieth-century bookplate was a warning. The twenty-first-century bookplate is a wink.

How to spot, commission or make your own

Spotting a bookplate is easy once you know where to look. Check the front pastedown — the inside of the cover — and the facing endpaper. Look for a small label, often with a printed border. A signature alone is not a bookplate. A bookplate is designed to be stuck in, not scribbled.

Commissioning one is also easier than you might think. Decide on size (most are around 80mm by 100mm), choose a printer or designer, and provide your name, a motto if you want one, and any imagery. Expect to pay from around £30 for a simple digital design to several hundred pounds for a hand-engraved plate. Order more than you need. Bookplates have a habit of migrating to new books.

Making your own is a lovely rainy-Sunday activity. A rubber stamp and acid-free ink will do. A linocut is more ambitious but very satisfying. Print onto acid-free label paper, leave it to dry properly, then stick it in with a certain smugness. Avoid ordinary glue sticks, which will wrinkle and yellow. Avoid superglue, which will destroy the book and possibly your relationship with the book.

The last word: ownership as a conversation

A bookplate is a small act of hope. It assumes the book will last longer than the mood that bought it. It assumes someone else will open it. And it assumes that the relationship between reader and book is worth marking, even if the marking is a cat in spectacles saying 'hands off, Dave'.

So next time you lend a book and never see it again, consider the ex libris. It will not guarantee its return. But it will make the loss feel more literary. And in Britain, that is practically the same thing.